A year ago today, the music world lost a great man and musician, Patrick Wedd, who had retired a year before as organist and music director at Christ Church Cathedral Montreal but whose reputation extended well beyond Canada. It was a personal loss for me, too: in addition to feeling incredibly fortunate to have sung with him for more than a decade, and to have had the privilege of sitting near the organ bench watching him play, Patrick was a dear friend.
Nick Capozzoli, our present assistant organist, had worked under Patrick for several years and became interim co-music director during the year after Patrick's retirement. Nick is one of the finest organists of his generation, following in Patrick's footsteps. As a tribute to his teacher and mentor, Nick put together this video, published today. The music is one of Patrick's favorite hymns, being sung in the crowded cathedral during his memorial service, and the photographs of Patrick and our choir were taken on several occasions by the diocesan photographer, Janet Best. At the end, our soprano section takes off in a descant written by Patrick for the final verse of the hymn.
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On Thursday, Donald Hunt, former assistant organist here in Montreal, and now director of music at Christ Church Cathedral Victoria, will present Olivier Messiaen's l'Ascension as a live-streamed concert in memory of Patrick Wedd. The movements will be interspersed with meditations on the scriptural verses to which they refer, by several of Patrick's clerical friends and colleagues. The links for that are here: To tune in live: https://www.facebook.com/MusicCCCVictoria/live_videos/
To watch on demand after the live stream: https://vimeo.com/user12422383
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The worst part about the current crisis for me personally, other than intense sadness about the loss of life worldwide, has been the loss of making music with others through singing. Added to that is the growing awareness that, because singing is one of the most dangerous activities, it may be a very long time before we can return to it. I was already fearing that I might be getting toward the end of my time as a choir singer, though I waffle back and forth about that. Now, in my worst moments, I wonder if I will ever return to it, after a lifetime of being in church and cathedral choirs.
However, our choir has just produced their first virtual-choir video, and we're working on two more which I'll share with you here when they're completed. It's a bizarre and quite self-conscious process, where you record your own part, solo, while listening to a backing track on headphones. The tracks were then assembled by our music director, Jonathan White, and the resulting video recording sounded remarkably like us -- the way our own particular voices blend and sound together. This video was played during the cathedral's Zoom service last Sunday morning, and a number of parishioners told me they were very moved to hear and see the choir again.
Patrick was one of the least technological people I've known in my life, but I know he would have been delighted. His focus was always on producing the best music possible and sharing it widely. He'd be happy to know that we're finding new ways to continue singing, continue performing, and bringing this tradition of liturgical music to people at a time when it particularly matters.
I think the situation between us can fairly be described as a dichotomy. I shall go on trying to sing until I am overtaken by natural or unnatural causes. You are close to taking a purely aesthetic decision - a measure of your seriousness towards singing - and giving up the art. The irony would lie with a disinterested third-party capable of comparing our competences. True I haven't heard you sing solo but I have heard the comparatively small group of sopranos in your choir singing together, separately from the others, and it was clear there would have have been no room for a duff voice. I, on the other hand, am still no better than a student. Adding the phrase "with unlimited potential" deserves closer scrutiny by anyone who imagines those words to be a compliment.
It is hard for me to put myself in your shoes. Imperfection for me is like a chronic disease; a defect may be finally erased, but chances two more will spring up in its place. Even so, if I can be exhilarated by a performance wherein I recognise the faults, consider what my mental state would be if your soprano voice could be magically reduced to a baritone and embedded in my vocal cords. A false hypothesis, of course. Resolving faults is my primary concern, and ironically, one of my great pleasures. For you it is probably akin to a minor irritation.
All the same the poignancy of your decision reaches out to me. We both have the same aim - to sing the best we can - but when Wednesday doesn't sound as well as Tuesday, and you suspect this difference to be irreversible, there is I suppose only one course of action. I tell myself I don't want to reach that stage, simultaneously knowing this to be childidsh. There is no merit in badly-sung music; and to accept badly-sung music is not in the best interests of music itself. The word sounds a little grandiose but "betrayal" springs to mind.
Posted by: Roderick Robinson | May 21, 2020 at 10:53 AM
Thank you for that beautiful hymn. It's a wonderful tribute to your dear friend.
And yes to all of what you are saying. At 63,I've been singing in church a very long time. It's how I worship, and I'm afraid it may be over for me, and all of us. As a college student and the years after, I had a church job where there was no choir. So I would select a solo to fit the lessons and work on it all week. I was worshipping all week to the ideas coming up in the Sunday service.
I miss my little Church of the Ascension in Sierra Madre, CA and I miss my even smaller choir deeply. Thank you for putting it so well in your blog.
Posted by: Susan Beach | May 24, 2020 at 10:59 AM